Out of Africa

The relationship of Karen and Denys is a prickly and, despite the era in which it is set, curiously modern one. It's also at the heart of this understated movie.

Streep may convince us utterly that she is in love with Africa, but our views of it are a little too stately to really feel the place.

My basic problem with this otherwise sumptuous and well-acted film is that I never was able to accept Redford in character.

Out of Africa is, at last, the free-spirited, fullhearted gesture that everyone has been waiting for the movies to make all decade long. It reclaims the emotional territory that is rightfully theirs.

Maybe the problem of the pacing is simply the nature of the beast these days with expensive period pieces. Once the difficult details are all in place, it may be too much to expect a director to resist milking every scene for more than it's worth.